1988
- July

A BRIEF INTRODUCTION

Hello, and welcome to the continuing saga of Dave Dickie and his quest
for the meaning of life. At the end of our last episode, he had finally
reached the conclusion that the only way to reach any meaningful
conclusions was to go out and experience life, not by sitting in front
of a word processor writing small books about his personal
experiences...whoops!

SOLICITING OPINIONS

Recently, an individual that I thought was a friend and, as it turned
out, is really a rabid mutant communist pointed out that this
proliferation of very long form letters about even such an obviously
fascinating subject as my life could quickly become boring to the
average individual. Fortunately, I don't associate with any average
individuals, so I concluded that this question could be safely ignored.
The small doubt was planted, however, and I have to lay this particular
ghost to rest. As a result, I would like everyone to photocopy the below
questionnaire and send the result back to me.

o Yes, I find Dave Dickie's life incredibly interesting and would
love to read his letters again and again
o Yes, I would like Dave to rip my heart out with his bare hands
next time he sees me

DAVE HAS A DRIVING PROBLEM

I and Jeff Stern, looking for a little relaxing exercise in the sun,
opted for golfing on the weekend of the 4th of June. It had been ages
since I had been on a golf course, so long in fact that I had forgot the
first golden rule of golf; the game SUCKS! Golf was clearly a game
invented for high power executives, since it tends to make one enjoy the
peace and relaxing atmosphere of the office, even if you happen to be
director of the Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant. In my case, it was only a
little less painful than jumping into a cold shower with fifty seven
cats strapped to my naked body. The first hole went well, other than a
slight miscalculation of the driving power of a putter blowing my nicely
placed ball off the green and into a sand trap. This resulted in a score
under two times par, certainly an acceptable average for a babbling
cretin. Later holes managed to lower that stellar evaluation of self
worth, however, to somewhere near the level of the crud you scrape off
your shoes after walking in the park. I can't complain, though; I had an
opportunity to learn a bit about physics as several holes served to
demonstrate significant scientific laws such as "a ball will remain at
rest regardless of the force of the swing if you miss it entirely".
This, if you missed the point, was not a good time. I do, however,
recommend golf for tax collectors and members of the NRA.

DAVE HAS A DIVING PROBLEM

The next day I had arranged to go diving with Al Barr, who was trying to
get back into the swing of scuba before his monumental six week trip to
Australia for biking and diving. The dive was not particularly exciting
due to really bad visibility, and we saw little of interest. Afterwards,
we stopped off at a restaurant for dinner. The waitress had emerald
green eyes that almost glowed. I couldn't help but watch covertly every
time she approached the table. I sensed her awareness of my interest,
and finally I had to ask the guestion. I looked up as she approached
with the check and said "Your eyes ... they're the most unusual color —
no, not just unusual, unnatural — hey, are those contact lenses or
what?". She wasn't amused at all, but the answer was yes, so it didn't
matter much.

A BEACH OF A TIME

The next weekend, Jennifer and Jeffrey arrived from San Francisco for a
visit. We headed off for the beach on Saturday. Going to the beach is
not what I consider a sensible activity. Getting sunburned and gritty
can be accomplished much more easily by, say, digging a grave. It might
make sense if anyone on the beach actually went into the water, but this
is a concept that is apparently before its time, since the ratio of
beachdwellers to swimmers is usually on the same order as the ratio of
inhabitants of New York City to the inhabitants of Pompeii. Anyway,
everyone else wanted to hit the beach, and since Jennifer and Jeffrey
are always attempting to avoid spending time with me by pulling stunts
like this, I thought I would tag along out of shear spite. Little did I
realize that I would remember that day for ... well, at least a month.
The truly shocking thing about the entire experience was that I enjoyed
it. I went running with Jeffrey down the boardwalk they reserve for
biking, skating, and jogging. This had proven to be a mistake in a
similar previous attempt on the Redondo Beach boardwalk...! can usually
run six miles without a problem, but for some reason that effort left me
exhausted after a scant two miles, not to mentioned bruised from running
into the occasional telephone pole. For some reason, my attention kept
wandering to the young women who were wearing outfits that provided
about as much concealment as strands of dental floss. Fortunately,
Venice beach was more conservative and I and Jeffrey had a nice long
run. Later, relaxing on the beach, we had an opportunity to watch a few
guys flying stunt kites dive bomb innocent bikini clad beauties
initially intent on sunning themselves, but who intelligently decided
instead to cower in the sand as wave after wave of the vicious things
flew past...

ART? WYETH NOT?

I and Char visited the Los Angeles County Art Museum to see the Helga
Exhibit, a series of paintings of a single model named, oddly enough,
Helga. Andrew Wyeth spent seven years doing a large number of pen,
pencil, charcoal, and water-color studies of Helga, and about ten or
fifteen finished works. Looking at the masterful renditions of Helga in
a variety of poses, clearly a full time task and a work of love, left
one in awe of Wyeth's ability to make a living without working at a real
job for seven years. Still, the exhibition was fascinating in its scope,
allowing a rare view of how much time and effort go into the creation of
a real work of art. Looking at the end result of the creative impulses
that moved Wyeth emphasized what those primal thrusts toward making and
living in an aesthetic environment were all about. It made me want to go
out and splatter paint on a rapidly spinning canvas in order to produce
one of those "spin art" things that were so popular when I was a kid.
Kidding aside, it was a very worthwhile experience, and I highly
recommend flying to Los Angeles to see it. Drop in an visit while you're
at it!

After we left the exhibit, we still had some time left, so we headed
over to another section of the museum set aside for modern art. The
first piece I examined looked like someone had splattered paint on a
rapidly spinning canvas. "Spin art!" I cried, "I can do this!11. It
turned out, however, that this was completely incorrect, and the artist
used a very sophisticated, high tech painting style that would be close
to impossible to recreate. He positioned a jet engine so the exhaust
pointed at a canvas, then poured paint into the exhaust stream so it
would splatter over the painting and, more importantly, the surrounding
countryside. We moved on. The next piece was vaguely reminiscent of the
"Eraserhead baby" (Eraserhead is a truly disturbed movie by David Lynch)
with hundreds of horrible pock marks, each with a smoking cigarette butt
hanging out of it. It was a powerful piece, if you consider making one
feel nauseous powerful. The next painting consisted of a frame around a
bright red canvas with nothing on it. The title was "blood", and I could
only pray that it was the artist's. We headed into an adjoining room to
see the rest of the exhibit.

The next piece was kind of a giant MTV video, with a pyramid of
excellent monitors rhythmically flowing into a variety of views of a
weight lifter working out on a nautilus machine. After five minutes of
the same basic theme I got the big picture (ha! think about it!) that
this was a long sequence of videos on a really boring activity. We left
quickly. The next room was obviously being renovated before the next set
of paintings were placed in it; one wall had huge holes knocked in it
and pieces of chalkboard were lying in neat little piles around the
floor. As we headed out the room, we bumped into a man who was just
standing in the doorway, looking slightly dazed. Curiosity overcame
common sense, and I asked "Uhhmmmm... what are you looking at?" "Why,
I'm experiencing this piece of art" he replied in a slightly puzzled
voice. "Moving, isn't it?" he added. I looked back into the room. A
sudden, horrible suspicion dawned. The holes in the wall... they were
too regular to be an artifice of construction workers. It indeed
appeared mm that an "artist" had come in with a hammer and whacked
irregular holes in the walls at two or three foot intervals to create a
piece of "art". I turned back to the man and smiled. "Yes, very moving.
And, by the way, welcome to the planet earth". Char immediately grabbed
me by the collar and dragged me away before the conversation could
continue. Too bad, since I was hopping to get the secret of
interplanetary travel out of him...
The next day I and Char tried our own hand at a little art, picking oil
pastels as the medium. It was a fun, cheap, messy way to spend the day,
and I recommend it as a good activity for a first date.

AN EDUCATIONAL EXPERIENCE

I started a new class at USC toward my Master's Degree. Digital Signal
Processing is a EE course, but it was the only class available during
the summer session that was eligible. I momentarily considered the
problem of not having the necessary EE background for the course, but
decided it wasn't an issue given the general level of intelligence USC
courses were apparently designed for (course prerequisite: student must
have at least equivalent analytical ability of your average slime mold
aggregation, speak four or more words of english, and must be capable of
sitting for two hours without excessive drooling). Wrong. The first day
of DSP began with the instructor saying "I expect everyone here has
extensive experience with Z transforms and Fourier Analysis, so we'll
skip that material and begin with discretized homogeneous polynomial
approximations to the Chebyshev Window function...". Still, the total
lack of appropriate background for the class at least meant that I was
learning something new, including the obvious fact that there are limits
on my ability to absorb knowledge like a bounty ("the picker quicker
upper") paper towel.

THE SLUG FEST

I flew into Washington, DC early on the morning of the 20th for a
Computer Aided Software Engineering (CASE) fair. It was interesting if
you love software development, a feeling that many doctors believe to be
indicative of massive brain damage.
I visited Bob Willis on Monday night, going out to dinner, watching
videos, and generally having a good time. I headed back to the
Washington Hilton, the convention hotel, about 10 p.m. Jet lag always
leaves me wiped and I was tired from the traveling on Sunday.

On Tuesday night, I headed over to see Bruce and Lisa Forbes, a couple I
hadn't visited since I left my old ASAS job six months before. We had
dinner and started on the traditional evening's activities, which could
be summarized as "drinking heavily". Its kind of a strange bonding
ritual where you try to pour out your soul before you pass out in an
alcoholic daze. True to form, Bruce and I were doggedly hanging on at
four in the morning after three six packs, two pitchers of daiquiris,
and a pitcher of Margaritas. Lisa is a little less capable of absorbing
alcohol by the gallon and had retired at 11:00p.m. At that point, my
soul was a puddle about an inch deep on the rug in Bruce's brand new
house, and I decided to head back to the hotel. Bruce's attempts to get
me to stay at the house failed, since I knew that if I did the chances
of my making it back to the Hilton for the morning seminars would be
about the same as surviving a passenger flight over the Persian Gulf. I
drove slloowwllyy and carreffuulllly back to DC, and arrived without
incident. I woke up to my own sense of time, which quickly informed me
that it was well past eight o'clock and that I was indeed late for the
first lecture. I called down to the front desk to find out the actual
time — there were no clocks in the room — and shot bolt upright as the
clerk calmly replied that it was quarter past eleven. I made a lightning
leap for the shower, making it almost two paces before my sorely abused
body screamed "IF YOU MOVE ONE MORE STEP AT THIS PACE I WILL BLOW THE
BACK OF YOUR HEAD ALL OVER THE WALL". This was followed by the sudden
realization that someone had whacked me across the back of my skull with
a sledge hammer and tied my stomach and intestines in a knot while I
wasn't looking. Wednesday was a very, very, very long and painful day. I
learned my lesson, however, and vowed not to drink anywhere near that
much again (until at least a few days had passed).

A SHOPPING WE WILL GO

Another simple rule for making life more bearable is: (a) never go
shopping for more than two hours at a time and (b) never, ever go
shopping for more than two hours at a time with a woman (ahhh.-.that may
appear to be a sexist remark. It isn't. Take my work for it) . I and
Char met Saturday morning in the garment district in LA. I had a simple
objective in mind; buy a few shirts and a couple of pairs of slacks. My
end of the conversation over the course of the day proceeded something
like this:

After eight hours and $500 dollars, I gave the moving company my home
address and asked them to have the stuff delivered by next week...

DAVE CLEANS UP HIS ACT AT A WEDDING

Eric and Cathy's wedding blossomed into a truly wonderful time. I
arrived in Syracuse NY on Thursday the 30th of June. Eric picked me up
at the airport shortly after I landed and we drove back to Ithaca
together. There is, of course, a simple rule concerning showing up early
at important social functions; anyone arriving well before the free meal
must be a good enough friend to put to work. True to this principal, I
had a broom in hand about five minutes after arriving at Eric's Co-op
(that, for those not in the know, is a semi-communal living arrangement
where several individuals occupy a large building, usually having
separate bedrooms but shared bathrooms and showers). Friday hosted a
similar arrangement between various cleaning utensils and my hands, with
Saturday running a close second. Even with these chores, however, there
was plenty of wandering the streets of Ithaca and chatting available
between cleaning activities. And the cleaning was rewarding in its own
way; it made me feel like a larger part of the wedding than I would have
if I had simply shown up on Sunday.

Part of the magic of the weekend was the other RPI grads who atte-nded;
Bob Willis, Marty Connell, and Mark Gaylo. One particular incident that
stays with me was after the reception Sunday night; Bob was about to
leave for Maryland, and the five of us (including Eric and myself)
gathered around in a circle near Bob's car. The conversation wasn't
especially significant, but picture of Eric in his white tux, the rest
of us dressed more or less formally, while the strongest sensations of
belonging and fellowship permeated the night air... I now know why
college reunions are so big.

There were plenty of opportunities for longer conversations with each of
them during the weekend as well, and these too had a strange brilliance
attached to them. Not that the conversations were extremely insightful,
or anything like that ... but these people belonged to a group I grew up
with, and talking to them after a few years with very little contact was
a oddly moving experience.

Mark Gaylo managed once again to surprise me by doing something
unexpected, which is surprising since Mark's well known delight in
surprising people by doing something unexpected is such a common
experience I should have expected it. Mark decided to return to RPI, the
bastion of technical supremacy, for a Master's degree in the humanities.
This is roughly equivalent to heading to South Africa in order to study
"democratic institutions in action". On the other hand, it does provide
the opportunity to party continuously for two years while maintaining a
pretense of working for a living. Hey, maybe I'll try it!

I also had a chance to meet a large number of new people, as well as a
few I had met at one time or another in the previous years. Two new
individuals in particular that I liked very much were the Bride's
brother (Hi Ron!) and mother (say hi for me, Cathy). It was really nice,
though, to break out and meet a few people I felt I could really enjoy
getting to know, even if they t did live on the east coast! It was also
nice to run into Nancy Barnes again, who put Eric and I up while we were
taking a week long tour of Canada a few (like six) years ago.

Was there anything else I forgot? Oh, yes, the wedding! No, only
kidding. The wedding and the reception were both very nice, and very ...
counter culture. I was most impressed with the Morris Dancers (Morris
Dancing is an ancient english form of folk dancing, tending toward the
ribald, and very formalized), particularly when they insisted that Eric
join them for a dance. They had their traditional colors on (white pants
and shirt with a green vest), and when Eric shucked his white jacket and
donned a vest, he looked born to the part. Cathy wore her mother's
wedding dress (with minor modifications) and looked simply stunning. As
she and Eric walked away from the ceremony, everyone took out the small
bundles of lavender and rose that Cathy and I had so laboriously tied
together the night before and pelted the couple with them.
Unfortunately, no one had explained that you were supposed to open the
bundles first, so Eric and Cathy had to run the gauntlet while small,
round, white packages bounced off their heads. The Usher who handed out
the bundles didn't understand the first thing about weddings (I was the
usher).

A CLASSIC SATURDAY

I and Jeff Stern had four tickets to the Garden Grove Shakespeare
festival for Saturday night. Unfortunately, Jeff also had many things to
do Friday night and Saturday morning, so I agreed to do the cooking for
the pre-play picnic we always have at these things. Jeffrey and Jennifer
were also down from San Francisco for the weekend. Saturday morning,
Jennifer and I went shopping, she for breakfast, myself for the
ingredients to a quiche and fruit salad. By the time we returned,
Jeffrey had finished the coffee, and Jeff and Jeff were both awake (if
not entirely alert). We opened a bottle of champagne and sat back on the
porch for a leisurely meal of croissants and raspberry danish. Orange
juice was provided along with the champagne and coffee, and I put on
Vivaldi's "The Four Seasons" for a little background music. I loved it.
After breakfast, I started working around the house. Laundry, baking the
quiche, making the fruit salad marinated in champagne, preparing the
back window and door for painting and caulking where necessary took up
most of the afternoon. We left for Char's place place about 3:00 to pick
up Char and Grace (a friend of Char's and as a result Jeff's blind date)
and headed for Garden Grove. We arrived with two hours to spare, but we
spent the time productively, ie eating and drinking more than would be
wise for a battalion of starving Ethiopians. The play, Richard the
Second, was an outstanding production, the best I've seen at Garden
Grove. This, of course, has absolutely nothing to do with the strangely
serpentine path we made walking to the play from the picnic...

Sunday the excessive food and mostly drink caught up with Char and I,
and we took it easy. I learned my lesson, however, and vowed not to
drink anywhere near that much again (until at least a few days had
passed).

SCHEDULING PROBLEMS

Murphy's law struck again. I forgot to mark the week of SIGGRAPH in my
appointment calendar. In a place like Los Angeles decent tickets to
plays and the like must be purchased well ahead of time. For instance, I
bought excellent tickets to "The Pageant Of the Masters" in Laguana
Beach. I stopped off at the Employee Recreation Center to pick up some
film, and while waiting innocently asked the clerk if they had tickets
to anything. "Oh yes", she replied, "we just received these tickets to
The Pageant Of the Masters, and they are excellent seats". I had never
heard of this particular production before, and asked what it was. "Oh,
it's wonderful, like where a bunch of famous artists take masterpieces
and recreate them while you stand there". "You mean you stand around
watching someone PAINT AN ENTIRE PIECE OF ART?!?" I said, astounded.
"Oh, no, they do it ahead of time". This conversation was obviously
headed for a rendevous with Amelia Airheart, and several minutes worth
of further chatter did nothing to make the actual purpose of this
presentation obvious. Finally, she said "Look, the seats are excellent,
and at $60 a pair, they're a steal". So I bought them. This, of course,
has absolutely nothing to do with the story I began talking about. So,
to return to the original subject, I buy tickets to things months in
advance, and usually have something planned about every other week. So
what week did I have tickets to Barnum and Bailey's Circus on Saturday,
the Hollywood Bowl on Sunday, The Pageant Of the Masters on Friday, and
the next Shakespeare play at Garden Grove on the following Saturday?
SIGGRAPH week, of course. The Circus tickets went to my parents, the
Hollywood Bowl tickets to one of my coders, and I'm flying back from
SIGGRAPH Friday morning.